'Recipe for traffic misery'

6:25pm Wednesday 3rd September 2008

Comments (2)   Have your say »

The proposed 15,000-home eco-town at Weston Otmoor would clog the A34 with cars and add half-an-hour to the journey from Bicester to Oxford, it has been claimed.

Kidlington parish councillor Andrew Hornsby-Smith has conducted a traffic survey on the southbound carriageway at Gosford and believes developers' figures for the number of people who would drive to work undermines Government claims that eco-town residents would ditch their cars.

Housing Minister Caroline Flint has called for at least one employee per house to use public transport, walk or cycle. Weston Otmoor's developers say it would have its own internal tram network as well as a frequent rail service to Oxford and Bicester.

But documents seen by the Oxford Mail show that developers Parkridge estimate that 5,000 people will commute from Weston Otmoor on weekdays, with the developers saying they would only restrict the number leaving by car to a maximum of 1,500 vehicles per hour.

A travel analysis conducted by the developer in January estimated that 56 per cent of car drivers would head south on the A34 to Oxford, Abingdon and further afield, while the majority of other commuters would use the rail links.

Parkridge also estimates that half the new households will have two cars and 10 per cent will have three cars.

Mr Hornsby-Smith, who has a masters degree in travel planning, said the effect of a further 850 cars per hour driving south in the morning rush-hour would cause serious problems on the A34.

He said: "The original concept of the eco-town was to put cars out of sight, out of mind, but these eco credentials have gone down the tube.

"This isn't a coherent transport plan. It's a recipe for traffic disaster and misery. The A34 is already at a standstill between 8.30am and 9am and the impact of all these cars would just make things much worse."

According to Department of Transport guidelines, a dual carriageway has a maximum capacity of 4,000 cars per hour. Mr Hornsby-Smith says his survey showed 3,000 cars an hour are already using the road.

Mr Hornsby-Smith, who conducted the survey in July, said: "The figures just don't stack up. If we've already got congestion problems, this could see thousands of cars stuck right back to the M40."

Parkridge spokesman Matthew Bryant said: "There's a lot of detailed work being undertaken at the moment - including a transport assessment - and it would be wrong for us to prejudge the outcome."